Stowing bucket style rear seats into a tub in the floor pan of a vehicle is known in the art. The typical vehicle allows for rear bucket style seats to be individually stowed into the floor of the vehicle to increase cargo capacity within the passenger compartment of the vehicle. While it may be desirable to be able to stow bucket seats, bucket seats provide limited seating capacity due to the size and shape of the seat. In order to increase seating capacity, many vehicles include a second row of seating in the rear which generally consists of bench style seating.
However, most bench seats cannot be stowed into the floor pan of the vehicle because of the body structure of the floor pan. For example, some vehicles have a feature formed into or under the vehicle floor known as the tunnel. The tunnel is frequently present in rear wheel drive vehicles including, for example, varieties of trucks and sports utility vehicles. The tunnel provides clearance and space for the drive shaft to pass under the length of the vehicle floor allowing for the transmission of power from the engine to the rear wheels. Passenger bench seats normally extend over the tunnel, preventing the bench seat from being configured to drop down and stow into the vehicle floor.
In some circumstances, the bench seat may be split into two segments comprising, for one example, 60% and 40% of the seat. The segment of the seat constituting 40% may be stowable (as it may not extend over the tunnel), but the remaining bench seat segment may not be stowable because of the tunnel. The inability of the bench seat to completely stow away into the floor pan limits the cargo capacity of the passenger compartment of the vehicle.